2gether

overall good but issues with ending

Nonspoilers:
I want to start off by saying in general I did like the show because to me it was a light, casual watch that both relaxed me and made me laugh from time to time. It was easy to immerse myself in and I was genuinely intrigued to see what all the twists would be and where certain character arcs would go. I wasn't particularly emotionally attached to the main couple, but I mostly rooted for them throughout the show, and there were some nice emotional scenes. However, I am relieved to see others agreeing that there is a somewhat "lack" of something deeper in their connection? I don't mean the complaints of lack of intimacy or sexual attraction, a couple is way more than that, but I mean as time goes on you can tell these two are not on the same page. I know a lot of dramas obviously have the characters run into the same problems but with this one it felt kinda useless because Sarawat tries his damned hardest to be a good boyfriend (and he is) but Tine's personal issues of jealousy gets in the way. Also, the side couples... geez. I do not support.

I do not mean to be too harsh on this show because it's still enjoyable and I mean I'm here for the ride and experience but it’s all the stuff at the end that makes it fall short. The ending felt rushed and unsatisfying.

Character specific spoilers, you can still read because I don't talk about plot things but if you don't want to know about the side characters' deal yet, I wouldn't read:

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Phukong and Man need to chase different people, they deserve so much better. Mil flip flops who he is interested in and he just doesn't make sense. He has potential to be a decent person but he does NOT have his priorities straight. And I straight up hate Type. Worst boy. Such an ass to Man and Sarawat.
We stan Fong for being the smartest one here.

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Cute serie, but more of a platonic looking couple.

Positive:
I found this serie very adorable, I enjoyed watching it and will continue watching Still 2gether and 2gether the movie ♡

I found the story enjoyable and would always be excited to watch the next episode, to me their relationship is adorable. The whole build up to the start of their relationship was quite a rollercoaster, but even though rollercoasters can be scary they are so much fun. Haha what I'm trying to say is that even with all the drama and craziness going on, it was worth the start of their love. Straight up had me giggling in bed...I would definitely rewatch this!

Negative:
Even though their relationship is adorable to me, like others say it's kind of more on the brotherly side, there were scenes indicating their romantic relationship but most of the scenes give off a more platonic type of relationship, lack of cuddles, verbal compliments to one another, etc. The usual relationshipy kind of stuff. Other than that I personally think it was a great series.

As for the side couples they were a bit eh, I didn't really know what to feel about them...Especially Mil and Phukong, I didn't really enjoy their couple, they didn't have that click that others may have. Man and Type were okay. I mostly just dismissed their couple though.

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I liked it but ..

so I've mixed opinions about this. I watched it while it was still airing & this was technically my first ever "bl". I remember how I binged the first 6 episodes in one sitting & the whole genre was a whole new experience for me which I enjoyed a lot. It did make the early quarantine days a bit bearable for me. I also remember thinking that I made a mistake by watching it too soon before the whole series was over cos I didn't wanna suffer every week for new episodes... yeah that's how much I loved it. But then once I started watching it every week my excitement for the series kept going down too. This series suffer from a very bad case of second half. The first half was so good which raised my expectations but it went a bit downhill as the show progressed imo. I still enjoyed the series as a whole but I admit that it did got a bit messy in the second half.
My overall rating for the series is 7 now but it used to be 8 a year ago. At that time I rated it on the basis of how much I enjoyed the first half but now that I look back I realise the second half did ruin the series for me . There's no doubt it's a fun series & I'm sure majority will have a good time watching it but I still feel the second half could've been so much better

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If I were a pick, I'd always choose you

This was very cute. I’m a sucker for a fake dating story and having a music trope and college setting just adds to the love.

Acting:

Everyone did a damn good job with their roles in this. I even got a couple good crier moments with Win shedding some tears, which I love. I was pleasantly surprised by the performances in this. The casting was superb for these roles. Bright and Win were absolutely perfect for Tine and Wat. The supporting cast was solid all the way through as well.

Writing:

I love a fake dating situation and add in that Wat was a pining fool for over a year prior is the cherry on top. I think it was pretty darn good up until that 3rd act breakup which I hated. It left no time for me to see a lovey-dovey happy ending. I want more than one time skip scene. But like, I get it, that’s kind of par for the course. I really enjoyed the show regardless, and the script was solid throughout. Didn’t love the use of female characters solely to make the mcs jealous, but it is a tropey bl, so like, not surprising. Don’t love all the misunderstandings and miscommunications, but at the same time it wasn’t absolutely horrendous the entire time and I’ve seen couples who are worse at communicating in my friend group so…

Chemistry/Romance/Kissing:

They had some damn good chemistry. They worked well in every stage of the relationship and it was lovely to watch. This was a very cute romance. The kissing was a but too light for a college romance in my opinion. I expect a little more, especially after they made up like why are we only high fiving.

Music/SFX:

Music was great. I actually loved that they didn’t use overly-produced recordings in the singing scenes, it made it feel real and raw which I haven’t really seen in a drama yet. SFX were good.

Now, for some highlights from my notes:

- Ahh yes a boyfailure
- Bro is dreamy
- Bi panic too real
- This is so cute what
- Bro is DREAMY
- Bro has Nirvana which is obv but also a 2013 Pierce the Veil, Mayday Parade You and me at Six & All Tim Low concert poster????? My man
- This little soon-to-be-awakened bi boy needs to chill
- Oh no baby is hurting stop hurting baby
- That’s so many photos baby down bad fr
- Boy denser than osmium
- *I'm just drunk again. I'll be drunk again. I'll be drunk again. To feel a little love*
- *Don't tell me what I wanna hear. Afraid of never knowning fear. Experience anything you need. I'll keep fighting jealousy. Until it's fucking gone*
- *Tell me why I see you in. Everything, everywhere all the timе. You follow me like a shadow
From you, therе's nowhere that I can hide. Life here without you's so shallow. And I wanna call you, but I don't. Ever wanna be the reason for tears that you cry. Everything, everywhere all the time. Wish I could forget you, but I won't. You’re everything, everywhere*
- Alright, fine. This show gets a playlist too I can’t help myself teehee
- Bro got me giggling
- His friends kinda suck
- *Suburban living with a feeling that I'm giving up everything for yoooooou*
- I hate it here
- Cuteeeee
- Why are we lyyyingggggg boy don’t piss me offfff
- Daaamn boys, moving a little fast, aren’t we
- PRECIOUSSS
- CUUUTE the PICK so CUUUTE
- Still 3 episodes left tho… Don’t put me through too much now
- *Not talk it out, now talk it out*
- Or not…
- Honey, sweetheart, can we take some deep breaths and think this through before we do something we regret
- Yeahh.. You really could’ve avoided all of this if you had explained things about Pam to your boyfriend, recommended a guitar teacher to her, and addressed everything properly when you say issues arising. This is almost entirely on you, Mr Dreamy
- Just talk it out after you chill for a minute, don’t give me this 3rd act breakup bs
- Bro, you walked in on a public hug, relax. The song thing is something to talk about, not flip your lid over. Jesus.
- Okay RELAX there, little man with the Bags by Clairo vibes
- Fucking 3rd act breakups always leave like 2 minutes of joy at the end

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They do belong together!

Watched when debuted in 2020. Finally getting my review in as I've re-watched this five times now!

This is a good one. Romantic Comedy genre
I believe as I was smiling a lot with the cheese factor and predictability.
There isn't any real conflict, drama, or exes busting in.

I was happy to see so many recognizable faces in this cast! To me it was star studded.
Bright (Sarawat) and Win (Tine) are handsome and talented.
Gun (Green) and Guy (Dim) made me laugh a lot!
Gunsmile (Boss) and Mike (Man) always add such comedy and sweetness to shows.
I can go on and on...I mean Khaotung, TopTap, Drake, Frank, JJ, etc..

Yes it is a trope filled of things that has been used many times before but this was refreshing. The music is great. I have Scrubb all over my playlists on Spotify.

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It's really suitable for audience for the first time watching bl drama

For everyone who want to see a BL drama, you could start with this drama. The scene has focus on their relationship and don't have much skinship like another drama. No bed scene :)

I kindly really loved this simply thing in this drama. BUT, simple doesn't mean it don't have any powerful scene. It's to simply! Too much guitar lesson part or something like that (about music ofc). Sometimes the cute scenes being bear or seem unfinished. I love the cliche idea love at the first time, Sarawat fell in love at Tine from Scrubb concert, but I don't get the sense how Sarawat struggle with his introvert side to confess his feeling or act he want to know that he had crush with Tine. Tine is really straighforward so I guess he will get weird act of Sarawat to show his feeling to him more reliable rather than story in this drama. Sarawat's personality really suit with Bright but at some scene I think Bright doesn't good there. On the other side, I love Metawin acting here! He could plays Tine really great!!

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A lot of defaults, quite entertaining in its first half then fizzling out

This BL thai story is quite a classical one: university background, two students part of the music club and falling in love with a fake relationship trope. On one side, we have Mr. Airheaded and on the other side we have Mr. Grumpy. One of the male lead is kind of dumb but in a somewhat endearing way while the other has kind of a creepy look and seem always upset.

It is somewhat stereotypical but it is also quite funny and I enjoyed the first half of the series more that the second half which felt a bit like a let down once the relationship settles. Of course, it is really not deep and you cannot take anything seriously. At least from my perspective, it was enjoyable for what it was but the stakes of the scenario were really never high enough for me to feel invested and really care.

Acting-wise, it was really not good. I might be biased, but Khaotung was the saving grace of the show...It is regrettable he just had a very minor role in the series. Sadly, the two main male leads were not that convincing together. They shared some cute and overall very platonic scenes but for me it was more akin to a bromance than a romance. Still, the main couple was the one I preferred with some of the jealousy as well as bromance aspects. Unfortunately, I did not care at all for the two secondary couples: chemistry was lacking as well as storytelling.

Production-wise, I am pretty disappointed by the musical side of the drama. It has been done much better in other more recent BL Thai drama (such as in Cutie Pie or in My School President ) and I was not subjugated by the singing of Bright (contrarly to what Nunew or even Fourth have shown in their respective series). Bright's character did not feel at all like the "genius" musician/singer he was labelled as during the full duration of the show. In addition to these issues, the editing between episodes and also even sometimes between scenes is quite jaring and the soundtrack is often misplaced, breaking the flow of the scenes.

I would not recommend this to people as I feel there are much better BL stories out there ,featuring more convincing musical sequences as well as better chemistry/acting. Despite its numerous defaults, I cannot say that it was not entertaining so you might want to give it a shot if you are looking for something very light and fluffy and do not mind some editing issue as well as some poor acting and storylines.

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Why so hyped?

Okay!!! I finally watched it and will write my honest review on this series. Me as an amateur Thai BL series watcher, I don't understand the hype about this drama. Maybe because I watched other BLs series such as "I told sunset about you", "Kinn Porsche", " Bad buddy" "The Untamed" or"A tale of 1000 stars" before I watched this series and therefore it has set high standards for me.

The worst thing for me about this series was the story and the chemistry between leads. I mean okay there was shortage of romantic chemistry between the leads here but even though if it was aiming to establish itself as a partial BL and bromance series, It failed terribly. I am not saying that there needs to be more intimate scene ,to make a series better. I always look for the narration and the acting. I mean let's take an example of the chinese series " The Untamed" or "Advance bravely" . These shows made me feel all the sizzling chemistry of the characters in every scenes that have left an imprint in my mind forever.

Also, the idea of the story seems to be intresting and would have been great if done with good execution and acting. They could have been given a better development of the story for the side couple. I also felt a bit of the plot to be slightly homophobic in the story at its initial episodes when Green was portrayed as an annoying character and Tine avoided him. Also the double standards of Tine being annoyed by Green pursuing him , by constantly following him and trying out different tricks and Tine doing the same thing with Sarawat. I mean even though it was supposed to be fake ... I have left no words to say. Just why???

Talking about the leads Both Bright and Win are good actors (considering the other projects) but the visuals and acting here did not aid to make the audience feel the emotions and compassion. Their chemistry was on and off with some awkward moments. I believe this is because the makers of the series did not invest time in workshops and thought the visuals are enough to make people's heart flutter(which seems to be true ,considering the hype).

Overall, it's a okay series and you can watch it for the Mesmerizing visuals of both Bright and Win ( Like come on !! I am really not complaining, they are beautiful)
But other than that , shouldn't expect more.

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5+ years later... does it hold up?

After 2gether's 5th year anniversary, I felt the urge to not only rewatch the immensely popular BL series for the first time in a while, but I also wanted to give a review.... as objectively as I can. Throughout 2021 and 2022, 2gether was a comfort series for me. The easy, light-hearted nature of the series was the biggest draw for me when I initially watched in the beginning of 2021. It was the first BL series that I watched, and I was blown away to see something so contrived with nearly every romantic trope in existence, but between two guys. For me, it was as if almost every m/m fanfiction that I've read in my adolescence was written into the script. It was something that truly felt revolutionary to me.

The BL genre has progressed so much since the year that this series dropped; from production value to less sanitized storytelling. Despite how much I enjoy this series, I can't help but feel the censorship. The only two BrightWin kisses here are mid-sentence surprises and mainly non-consensual. And while I'm on the topic, consent is a lingering theme in the background of this series that could've been handled more gracefully. I won't dwell because anything done here without consent isn't nearly as egregious as some non-consensual acts from many other series produced around the same time (TharnType, I'm looking at you).

2gether falls victim to lazy contrivances for the convenience of drama. Simple communication, peripheral vision, and the ability to read body language would have saved our romantic leads from most of the trouble coming their way. It's nothing that you aren't already used to from Asian television but always so much more noticeable after the first viewing. However, none of the drama or third-party obstacles that our leads endure last longer than a single episode, until the final two episodes. As I've previously mentioned, this series is very light-hearted and I am very appreciative of a show where two previously straight-identifying young adult men find love with each other without the existential dread of queer realization. The first 10-ish minutes of episode 10 if a great example of that. Shortly after Tine and Sarawat decide to officially give their relationship a try, Tine is faced with the struggle of coming out to his friends. For a while, I thought the episode was going to be about how they navigate their relationship in secret; but that didn't even last for the entirety of the first 10 minutes of the episode before Sarawat exposed their relationship publicly. To no objection.

Many may look at that as a narrative flaw but after having nearly all of queer representation on TV from the west be founded on queer existential dread, it was refreshing to see a story where a gay relationship was outed, and everyone was supportive. And by episode 10, it's no surprise that Tine's friends were supportive, so it doesn't feel forced or rushed. With only 4 episodes left, I appreciate not wasting time on the drama of coming out.

Another thing that has bugged me about the public discourse of this series is that no one ever mentions how comical it actually is. There are many BL "romcoms" that I can name but can't think of any jokes or funny scenarios from the show on the top of my head. That's not the case here. For all its flaws, from the subpar production value, the censoring, the acting (which I personally think is fine, apart from Bright's crying scenes), etc, no one could ever say that 2gether isn't funny. I genuinely think it's one of the objectively funniest romcom BLs in existence, and that's even in comparison to many of them made today.

And maybe I'm leaning completely into subjectivity here, but I also think that BrightWin have great chemistry. Over the years, one of the most common criticisms of this show is that the romance feels more like a "straight bromance". Personally, I think they have good romantic chemistry and I'm certain that if the narrative didn't intentionally romanticize their interactions, less people would feel the opposite. To that critique, I say be your own judge. For me, the longing glances and reddening cheeks do it for me.

With 5 years of separation, I'm happy to finally view this series with a somewhat more objective lens. It's hard to watch 2gether now and think that I'd ever recommend it without a disclaimer. Yes, it's censored. It's very much of its time. But it's not bad at all. And I'd still argue that it's a good choice for your first BL.

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Oh dear. I really shouldn't have bothered.

I'm going to be honest - I read too much about this series before I watched it to give an unbiased review. I read a lot of comments on the MDL page, I read comments on the YouTube videos and I read a lot of speculation about why this series went off the rails the way it apparently did.

After watching, I'm halfway convinced there was no other way it could go.

The whole premise of the plot was overturned in the first half of the series, leaving it nowhere to go. The story started as a fairly standard one in BL - Young man A (Tine) is being pursued by Young Man B (Green). Young Man A has no interest in B because he's interested in girls, not boys.

Which he declares multiple times an episode whilst also making a point to ogle girls he considers pretty and try to date them. Because he's not interested in boys. No sirree. Not at all.

Young Man C (Sarawat) just might be the exception. He's the traditionally masculine, very handsome and talented young man that A recruits to fake flirt with to drive B away. Young Man B, as is the case with most Thai BL's, has a high pitched voice and feminine mannerisms and is, well, a raging stereotype.

Kudos to this series, though, for avoiding the colourism usually present in Thai BL - B is as light skinned as the rest of them. Now if only one of the leads was darker skinned, it would've completely subverted the trope which would have been even better. Baby steps, I guess.

Then it turns out, as we find out about halfway through the series, that Green hasn't really been pursuing Tine seriously. He had recently broken up with his boyfriend Dim (the president of the university music club that Sarawat and Tine belong to) and was using Tine to make Dim jealous.

Now, if this had happened later in the series, it might have worked out better, but it happened so early that the series had about six episodes to try and fill in and the writers couldn't seem to figure out exactly what they wanted to do. They could have given a bit more time to the side couples, instead of wasting the acting talents of Frank and Drake by having them appear for five minutes every episode.

No, instead we get this mess that just irritated me.

Here's the thing: when Sarawat agrees to fake flirt with Tine to chase off Green, he declares he's going to actually flirt with Tine. And then he says he's not. And then he says he is. And then he says he was joking.

And it continues on like this for most of the episodes. Poor Tine, who you can see is beginning to develop feelings for Sarawat (even if he has Wei Wuxian levels of obliviousness about it), doesn't know whether he's coming or going because Sarawat is....well, tbh, I'm not sure what Sarawat is doing.

It *looks* like he's playing shitty mind games with Tine, but I suppose it could just be his insecurity over actually getting the chance to be with Tine.

Then we get to episode 12 and everything goes to hell-lite because Sarawat forgot himself and Tine's, for some reason, lost all his confidence. Has anyone seen that, by the way? It was around for about six or seven episodes and then slowly slunk away somewhere. If you do see it, send it back would you?

Tine catches Sarawat in an embrace (a very clearly one-sided one) with his "friend" Pam and jumps to conclusions and gets very upset and runs away and cries, and then runs outside (where it is now somehow night even though it was daylight five minutes ago) where he runs into Mil and collapses.

Sarawat comes along whilst Mil is bundling Tine into his car to take him to hospital and he forgets himself completely and doesn't just get into the car (which he would've done two episodes ago.) He doesn't visit Tine in hospital, (presumably because he's still forgetting himself) and ambushes Tine outside of it and *still* doesn't just get in the car before Mil drives Tine away.

The ending consists of Sarawat singing a song for Tine and asking him, in front of all the extras they could hire for this mess, if Tine trusts him again. It's the perfect setup for a kiss. No, really,. Since the end of episode 2, Sarawat has been the one doing all the flirting (and then denying that he's flirting but, you know, you have to have something to deny doing in the first place, so it *counts*) and Tine's been acting all shy and coy.

This would have been the perfect moment for Tine to initiate something. To take charge. To lean in and kiss Sarawat and then say his line. And does he do that? No. They re-unite, happy endings all round, and do they kiss after that? No. Sarawat has been obsessed with grabbing Tine's 'boobs' for the last 11 episodes so maybe he sneakily does that? Yeah, no.

These are the two most chaste young men I've ever seen on a drama series. "If you keep looking at me like that, I'll kiss you til you drop."

Yeah, right, Sarawat. You kissed him a grand total of: once.

And he didn't drop.

I guess double high-fives are the new kissing?

In summation (because this got really long and rant-y but I'm not sorry because this had the potential to be so bloody good and it was ruined) - don't bother. Bright and Win 's acting isn't bad, though they are outshone by Frank, Drake, Toptap and Mike, and the soundtrack is great, but this show got lost in adaptation and whoever wrote this should just stick to original material and not ruin any more books.

If I sound like a bitter old person, about this it's because I am.

Bah! Humbug!

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The best BL drama out there

This is that one drama that made me want to watch even more BL dramas. What I don't get is why are people criticizing it . I mean it does have a plot that is kind of overused and predictable but what matters is how it has been executed. Whoever decided to give Bright and Win the lead roles deserves an award. They played their parts as Sarawat and Tine so well that I found myself falling in love with the characters, this is very important in drama's because if the person who's watching doesn't get attached to the characters they may later find themselves dropping it. The acting was *chefs kiss*. Another thing that I loved was that things didn't happen all of a sudden we saw Tine starting to realize his feelings and then later accepting them. On the other hand, we saw that Sarawat despite his attitude to Tine when Tine approached him had liked him for some time. Then we see Tine struggling because of his insecurities thinking he wasn't good enough for Sarawat, and how Sarawat after finding out tells him that it doesn't matter in his eyes Tine is flawless. Another reason I kept watching were the friends of both, they were such crackheads now that I think about it. Also the side ship with was so cute. Lastly, the music was fantastic , the music always added a lot to the atmosphere and was always played in the right situation. Writing this makes me rewatch it for the 4th or 5th time I think

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